For one shining moment last week, it looked like the world might be getting the greatest legal reality show of all time, Rudy Giuliani: Pro Se Litigant. Sadly, it was canceled in its infancy when one Joseph Cammarata, a divorce lawyer from Staten Island, entered an appearance in the collection action filed by Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss against America’s onetime Mayor.
Rudy’s current lawyers, Ken Caruso and David Labkowski, are noping out (or trying) lest they be forced to make false representations to Judge Lewis Liman. Notably, this scruple does not extend to Rudy’s appeal in the DC Circuit of the underlying case brought by the Atlanta poll workers he defamed.
“It is one thing to represent a client on appeal, where the record is fixed, the issues are purely legal,” they huff. “It is another to represent that …” This is followed by several lines of black bars, presumably laying out all the lies Rudy wants his lawyers to tell the court about the location of his assets and whether he resides in Florida for the purpose of the homestead exception to judgment collections.
For his part, Cammarata appears to be a wee smidge rusty on his federal procedure. In the week since he entered his appearance, he’s managed to improperly docket three filings, including an appeal which was apparently defective in all the ways.
Freeman and Moss say they do not object to the substitution of counsel, so long as it doesn’t delay the trial, which is set to begin on January 16. But of course, Cammarata wants to do just that. He’s requested not only a 30-day delay of all deadlines, but a postponement of the trial so that Rudy can spend the entire week before inauguration partying in DC.
“To the extent that Defendant requests an extension of deadlines that would expire prior to November 26, 2024, that request is denied. All deadlines remain in place,” Judge Liman harrumphed. “To the extent that Defendant’s letter requests additional relief beyond an extension and substitution of counsel, those requests must be made by formal motion and will be disregarded.”
Cammarata went on to lecture the court on all its prior errors, going so far as to suggest that forcing Giuliani to surrender his possessions without an appraisal — which Caruso and Labkowski never asked for! — “has taken away Defendant’s statutory and constitutional rights.”
Meanwhile, Rudy’s pals are playing knifey-spooney over subpoenas. During his disastrous foray into bankruptcy, his girlfriend Maria Ryan once indignantly denied being served, snorting to counsel at Akin Gump that, “I think you’ve been duped! If you paid money for this service I would get your money back!” This was despite an affidavit by the process server that included a picture of Ryan taken at the time of service.
This time around, Ryan, along with Rudy’s henchmen Ted Goodman and Ryan Medrano, along with yet another shell company called Standard USA LLC, have finally, after multiple court orders, responded to subpoenas for information … sort of. For instance, the subpoena demanded that Rudy identify, for any transfer of funds to himself, “(i) the parties to the transfer, (ii) the identity of the property transferred, (iii) where applicable, amounts transferred, (iv) the date of each transfer and (v) the consideration, if any, given in exchange for each transfer” along with “the name and address of the institution and the name and number on the account(s) from which and/or to which the transfer was made.”
To which Cammarata responded on Rudy’s behalf:
But the plaintiffs’ lawyers at Willkie Farr & Gallagher have also played knifey-spooney before. And this morning they informed Judge Liman that they would not be seeking to compel FakeAss LLC, Ryan, Goodman, or Medrano to comply. The would instead be “reviewing these responses and will seek further relief from the Court as may be necessary.” [Cough, sanctions, cough.]
And then this afternoon, they docketed another wildass letter to the court documenting Rudy’s efforts to obstruct collection, including social media posts by a guy calling himself “Joe the Box” who owns the America First Warehouse in Ronkonkoma where Rudy moved his possessions after stripping his Manhattan Apartment. Mr. “Box” promises to film counsel for the plaintiffs as they attempt to inventory the property.
“In light of this conduct, Receivers have not returned to the [Warehouse] Facility as planned, and do not believe it would be safe, efficient, or practical to do so,” the lawyers for Freeman and Moss write.
They also have some choice words for Cammarata:
At 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning, Mr. Giuliani’s new attorney in this matter held a press conference outside of the New York City offices of Willkie Farr & Gallagher (Receivers’ counsel). Mr. Cammarata is a member of the New York Bar, presumably familiar with Rules 3.4, 3.6, 4.1, and 8.4 of the New York Rules of Professional Conduct, and has his own office at which he is capable of hosting press conferences—it is unclear why Mr. Cammarata thought it appropriate to target Receivers’ counsel by staging a press event at that location. In any event, during that press conference,3 Mr. Cammarata launched a variety of attacks against this proceeding, Receivers’ counsel, and the underlying judgment[.]
Judge Liman has scheduled a hearing for Tuesday on all the impending issues. Feels like Caruso and Labkowski might not be getting their hall pass signed quite yet.
Liz Dye lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos substack and podcast.
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